For months (or years … or decades), Mainers have been awaiting this year’s moose-permit lottery, during which they’ll find out if they’ll be allowed to head afield on the hunt of a lifetime this fall. In all, 2,740 permits will be allotted on Saturday during a drawing that will be held in the western Maine town of Bethel. If you’re not doing anything else, you may want to head out Route 2 and take in the festivities, as organizers have a weekend full of events planned, including the lottery itself. Who knows? This might be your year … and it would certainly be cool if you were on hand to find out in person!
— John Holyoke
Casting with colleagues: If you don’t bleed, you’re ahead of the game
Luckily, my boss, Sarah Walker Caron, is intrigued by fly fishing — though she’d never fished at all until I dragged her onto the ocean last summer. And luckily, she’s a big fan of the movie “A River Runs Through It” (or, at the very least, a fan of Brad Pitt standing on a rock in the middle of that river, waving his fly rod around and looking all Brad Pitt-y).
Editor’s note: Can you blame me? Fly fishing looks so graceful and beautiful in that movie. And Brad. Pitt.
And that, as far as I can figure, is why two of my BDN colleagues wound up on the Kenduskeag on Friday, May 29, for an introductory fly fishing lesson conducted by … um … me.
Even bird count failures can be fun
Success makes a good story, but failure is much more interesting. Failure is a common theme whenever my birdathon team makes its once-a-year quest to find 130 birds in one day. This was the 16th year that the Cardinal Sins assembled at 2 a.m. to search for nocturnal birds.
Maine turkey hunt helps man finish 48-state quest
For the last nine years, David Ellis has logged thousands of miles and spent thousands of dollars in a quest to bag a turkey in each of the 49 states that have the birds.
On May 25, thanks to the kindness of a landowner near Bath, the 33-year-old from Conyers, Georgia, added his 48th state to his life list. Only Hawaii remains before he completes a feat known as the “U.S. Super Slam,” successfully harvesting a wild turkey in all 49 states where hunting is allowed. Alaska is the state where there is no turkey hunting.
Blog log
Act Out with Aislinn: 1-minute hike: Curtis Farm Preserve in Harpswell
Curtis Farm Preserve, named after the last family to farm the property in 1940, is owned and maintained by the Harpswell Heritage Land Trust, which purchased the bulk of the property in 2011 with donations from more than 160 contributors. An additional 14 acres was added in 2013, bringing the preserve to 86 acres in total size — a large piece of land for the coastal town of Harpswell.
On the horizon
We know that prospective hunters and their families will be eager to find out if they know any of the lucky hunters whose names are drawn on Saturday, and the BDN will again serve as an important source of that information. We’ll post the names of all 2,740 permit winners at 7 p.m. (maybe a bit sooner) on Saturday at our home page. Click in early and often … and tell your friends where they can go to find out who’s in … and who has to wait another year.
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